In general, ball check valves are used in a variety of applications. While in some applications the design of such valves is not particularly critical, it is of course always desired to provide a check valve construction which is inexpensive to manufacture, operates effectively and is easy to assemble and disassemble. In particular, when pumping highly viscous materials which may have fibers therein, it is important to provide a ball check valve which allows material to flow through the valve without clogging or plugging and which provides no dead spots which encourage such results.
In one prior art design manufactured by Deltrol, a one piece metallic housing has a cruciform molded plastic insert threaded therein. The insert has a generally u-shaped cross section (with the cross section is taken across the diameter). The u-shape retains the spring and ball therein. Such prior art valves while generally effective, do provide an unduly restricted flow and are subject to clogging. Additionally, the threads on the insert may tend to strip and such parts are relatively expensive to manufacture.
It is therefore an object to the instrument of invention to provide ball check valve which is inexpensive to manufacture and easy to assemble. It is further an object of this invention to provide ball check valve which flows material without clogging or plugging and which minimizes the dead spots therein.